Edwin Pfanzagl-Cardone: “About 10 days ago we have had the honour to host Krzysztof Penderecki both as composer and conductor at the same time: the Mozarteum Orchestra Salzburg has performed his Violin Concert No.2 “Methamorphosen”, with the brilliant Spanish violinist Leticia Moreno and maestro Penderecki himself conducting. This is what I would call an “authorized” version….If I am allowed a side note – because it was a great surprise to me: the tremendous resolution of the BPT microphone, localisation-wise. Apart from the solo-violin there is also a part in Penderecki’s concert with a kind of cello-solo, where the melody is passed from the first to the second cello, which were seated right next to each other, maybe 1m (3 feet) apart.
At that moment I was not looking at the stage, but listening via headphones, when I thought “What is going on, why am I hearing a change in localisation ?” Looking down on stage I realised that it was the second cello playing, instead of the first …
Given the fact that the fixed-installed BPT microphone at the Grosse Festspielhaus venue is approx. at 12m distance to the conductor (due to sight-line restrictions)and therefore at least 14m from the celli, the location change of the sound source by 1m means a change in localisation by about 4 degree. The localisation resolution of human hearing is in the range of about 3 degree (depending on the test listener) …
The fact that I was able to detect the change of handover of the melody-line from cello 1 to cello 2, listening via headphones to signals from a microphone that far away from the sound source seems to indicate that the resolution of the NEVATON BPT is at par or at least very close to the accuracy and resolution of human hearing, even if it is placed outside the reverberation radius of the room …”